FishyJoe said: I don't know how effective these ads are. It sure didn't seem to help HS a whole lot despite the fact is was one of the most heavily advertised games this season. |
That's not the point though, Fishy. What you're doing here is basically questioning the significance of advertisements altogether. The Heavenly Sword commercials are totally stereotypical -- they are advertisements completely funded by Sony for a game completely funded by Sony on a console developed by Sony. That's your typical advertisement; the producer of a product advertising said product.
The Simpsons Game is another matter entirely. It's a multi-platform game that's advertised with the PS3/PS2/PSP versions exclusively shown. The advertisements don't make it clear that the Wii and 360 versions even exist -- it's very much akin to the Guitar Hero and Madden commercials, which only showed the 360 versions.
And if you look at how those two titles are working now, it really looks like Madden is now dominated by Xbox360 and Guitar Hero is at least recognized as a multiplatform title now, instead of a Playstation exclusive, based on sales. Within a couple weeks, I think we may find that more people buy that game on Microsoft's consoles than on Sony's, which really is quite an achievement.
Of course, I don't think all of those sales or sales trends can be attributed to the advertisements in question, but I do think you could make a compelling argument that Microsoft's advertising deals with Activision and EA have paid off swimmingly for all involved, and that Sony may reap similar benefits with The Simpsons Game (I especially like that Cars Blu-Ray ad, actually, which emphasizes that the PS3 is a Blu Ray player).